Port Leon

Port Leon stood across the St. Marks River about two miles south of here as the terminal of the Tallahassee-Saint Marks Railroad, which was critical to shipping materials from what was then called Middle Florida and southern Georgia. In 1839, Richard Keith Call, president of the Tallahassee Railroad Company, founded Port Leon as the railroad terminus to capture the cotton shipping business from Magnolia and St. Marks. At this location, the company built a bridge with two openings over the St. Marks River according to the Town lattice design. Businessmen from Magnolia quickly bought lots, built warehouses, and benefited from the new port city, and freight was no longer loaded in St. Marks. Port Leon had twenty or more houses, a saw mill and grist mill, warehouses, a hotel, two taverns, a post office, and a newspaper. Established in 1838, it became the first county seat when Wakulla was carved from Leon County in 1843, but only a few months later a hurricane destroyed the town and swept the bridge up the St. Marks River. Residents boated around the remaining center post for decades afterward. After the hurricane, the railroad company quickly announced that freight would again be accepted at the St. Marks terminal, and Port Leon's residents moved upstream to establish Newport. All that remains are disturbed lands in the St. Marks National Wildlife Refuge and the railroad bed now part of the Florida National Scenic Trail.

St. Marks, Florida · United States